Use of Force: Spokane Police Department
November 2013
Voiceover: Beat Intro
00:00
This is the Beat—a podcast series that keeps you in the know about the latest community policing
topics facing our nation.
Barry Bratburd
00:08
Hello and welcome. My name is Barry Bratburd and on behalf of the COPS Office I’d like to introduce
you to Assistant Chief Meidl from the Spokane Police Department, who is here today to discuss use of
force issues. Has your agency been concerned about use of force issues—can you talk about that for a
minute?
Craig Meidl
00:27
You know it seems to be not just use of force in general, but mostly it’s the—tends to be the use of
deadly force—that seems to be the hot topic with most of our community. We had an incident about
seven years ago with one of our officers, who got into a fairly prolonged scuffle with a—turned out he
was a janitor, not working at the time, was schizophrenic—as a result of the scuffle the individual
ended up dying. The officer was charged with civil rights violations, ended up getting convicted and
sentenced for about three and a half years of prison. Another officer pled to perjury and was forced to
resign as well. And seven years later we’re still dealing with some of those issues as well. So that’s led
to a Use of Force Commission that was implemented by the Mayor’s office. As a matter of fact, at the
time the then-mayor had asked the Department of Justice to come in and review the Spokane Police
Department. However, in the process in waiting for the Department of Justice to get back to us, she
implemented a use of force commission, and they came out with 26 recommendations for
improvement—19 of those applied directly to the Spokane Police Department and we’re in the
process of working through those recommendations right now.
Barry
01:43
Now, what are the ways you work with the community to foster better relationships with the
department?
Craig
01:48
We actually have a community outreach group that Chief Straub started. We have three full-time
employees dedicated to nothing but community outreach. We have our shift commanders and our
bureau commanders meet with the neighborhood council meeting groups once a month. So within
Spokane there’s a bunch of neighborhood councils divided up into people of interest within that
community, so they meet every month with those groups. We have a monthly meeting with NAACP.
We meet the Native Project group, which represents Native Americans within the community. And we
also have monthly meetings now with media directors, all the media directors within the city of
Spokane. And then we’re starting to get some more programs—we just started a basketball program
this summer for disadvantaged students, and so we’re slowly reaching out and meeting with more of
the groups within the community.
Barry
02:42
Great. Now do you think you’ll be able to use the recent COPS publication on the Collaborative Reform
Process—our review of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department?
Tony
02:53
Absolutely. In reading the report and listening to the discussion, so much of what they experienced is
what we’re experiencing—maybe not at that level. One of the things that the sheriff talked about was
they had broad community support, he said 70 percent of their community supported them, yet there
is still this concern about the officer-involved shootings. We have broad community support as well,
but the use of force issues tend to create concern within the community, so the tools, the policies, the
training—everything that they have done to address those concerns directly applies to the Spokane
Police Department as well. So we could almost take everything they’re doing and move it right to the
Spokane Police Department.
Barry
03:31
Great. Now how would you assess your agency’s policies and practices involving use of force?
Craig
03:36
It’s funny. I was reading the book Blink by Malcolm Gladwell, and one of the things he discusses in the
book is we’re never very good at analyzing ourselves. We always look at ourselves through our own
lenses, and despite our best efforts trying to be as accurate as we can, we are still colored by the
lenses that we see ourselves in, and I would say that also applies to uses of force. Especially if you’ve
come from within the department, and you’re promoted from within the department, you’re used to
this system, you don’t know any other system. So you’re not as aware of what other agencies are
doing. And one of the nice things of having Chief Straub come in—and then we’re also having
Department of Justice come in under a technical assistance program letter—and look at our system, is
where can we improve? We think we’re doing pretty good, but we know we can improve. And it’s
always been official when you can have another outside entity come in and examine it and work
collaboratively with you to develop those processes. So I would also throw out that any use of force
policies are more of a, kind of a living, breathing document—they change based on state law, federal
law, case law—so you really do have to constantly be evaluating your use of force policies to make
sure they’re in-line with the law.
Barry
04:49
Now who are your stakeholders in the community that you routinely work with, and what
relationships have helped your agency in terms of building better community relationships?
Craig
04:57
Some of the ones that I’ve mentioned—NAACP is definitely a stakeholder, our neighborhood council
groups are stakeholders. The media is a huge stakeholder—I mean they’re the ones that get our
message out more than any other entity, so meeting with them monthly. I’d also say we’re working
closely with the school district as well, now. We’re discussing do we want to put officers in the schools.
So those are the types of things we’re working on.
Barry
05:23
Great! Well that’s all we have for you today. Thank you so much for coming out. We appreciate your
time and sharing with us your story.
Craig
05:30
Great, thank you very much.
Voiceover: Beat Exit
05:32
The Beat was brought to you by the United States Department of Justice, COPS Office. The COPS
Office helps to keep our nation’s communities safe by giving grants to law enforcement agencies,
developing community policing publications, developing partnerships, and solving problems.
Voiceover: Disclaimer
05:48
The opinions contained herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official
position or polices of the U.S. Department of Justice. References to specific agencies, companies,
products, or services should not be considered an endorsement by the authors or the U.S.
Department of Justice. Rather, the references are illustrations to supplement discussion of the issues.